


Searching the Voids

by blueharlequin



Series: Adventures of the Sailing Ship Sam Winchester [5]
Category: Person of Interest (TV), Supernatural
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, BAMF Sam Winchester, Canon Disabled Character, Crossover Pairings, M/M, May/December Relationship, Minor Violence, Name Changes, Rare Pairings, Sam Winchester Deserves to be Happy, Scholar Sam Winchester, Secret Identity, Threesome, Timeline What Timeline
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-11
Updated: 2019-08-30
Packaged: 2020-08-18 20:11:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20197477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueharlequin/pseuds/blueharlequin
Summary: Sam crosses paths with Harold, with a current number, and with John. Imagine their interest when Harold finds out Sam doesn't exist in any of the Machine's data.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This fic (or at least Sam's background) will not make any sense unless you read [The Alexandria Organisation](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19455925) first.
> 
> Timeline is totally fudged in this as I have season 10 Sam interacting with season 2 John and Harold.
> 
> I write for fun, Grammarly is my beta

The first time Sam ran into him, he had just arrived in New York and was waiting for an assignment. He had a sore throat and was browsing the medicine aisle of the local bodega next to his hotel. A short older man was perusing the shelves and Sam clocked the moment he found what he looking for on the top shelf. He saw the man sigh and look around for a clerk; Sam knew the only one in the store was up at the register with a line of customers. Without asking, he grabbed the item off the top shelf and handed it to the other man. The man said, "Thank you." Sam just smiled in return and went on his way, his head cold preventing him from recognising the momentary disorientation from hearing your words. He didn't give the encounter a second thought, after all, when both sets of your words are that common, you sort of forget to note them after a while.

The second time they ran into each other, Harold was walking Bear to give them both a chance to get out of the library and to relax since their current case just ended. A young man bumped into him, and Harold was surprised because as large as he was, the bump barely registered. "Sorry!" he blurted out dropping a slim package. "It's quite alright," Harold returned, distracted as Bear tugged on the leash, eager to continue. The young man scooped up his package from the ground and watched the man walk away. He remembered the bodega and dismissed the run in. It could just be coincidence; he's not that far from his hotel, the man must live around here. Across the street, a man in a black suit took note of their brief encounter.

* * *

"Our number today is a rare book thief, Gary Delaney. He's already been arrested several times for possession of stolen property, but managed to have the charges dropped by his lawyers." Harold made a speculative noise, "Very good lawyers that he shouldn't be able to afford." He rubbed his chest idly, and John looked at him strangely, "What?"

"You seem to be doing that a lot lately." Something about the action gave John a vague sense of déjà vu. Harold rubbed his chest again and it suddenly clicked. This was not new behaviour, this was something John had seen before, had experienced before and repressed violently. They had ignored their bond at first, acknowledging the words, but not doing anything about it. They had spent their time mildly sniping at each other until Root had kidnapped Finch and they both realised what idiots they had been. "You've met your other soulmate," he breathed out.

Harold looked stunned. He pulled up another screen and started typing furiously. Numerous camera feeds popped up with Harold in them, walking Bear, walking to the library, shopping, and so forth. They both anxiously scanned the feeds, Harold grumbling when he spied John following him in a few of them. "There," he pointed to the feed on the street where a young man had bumped into him. John only caught it because he remembered seeing it, the encounter had stuck with him because it wasn't often that John ran across someone taller than him.

Harold made a funny noise, "He said my words but he's not reacting like I said his." Harold paused for a moment, squinting at the screen. John saw his eyes grow wide then he started typing again, even more swiftly than before. Another window popped up, this time it was a grainy black and white security camera in a convenience store. John could see the top of the young man's head over the aisle, Harold switched to another camera and the angle now showed Harold in the same aisle perusing the shelves. The young man plucked something off the top and Harold said something. The picture was not clear enough to see his face but they both saw him shiver briefly as he walked away.

"I don't think he realised I said them since all I said was 'thank you.' My God, can you imagine the number of people who have said that to him in his life?" Harold pulled up a composite program, trying to find a good angle to plug the young man's face in to get a positive ID.

John sighed, as much as he wanted to pursue this right now, they had a number to work on. Also, there was no guarantee that Harold's other soulmate was his too. Statistically, it would make sense, double bonds of two were even less common than triads. However, he wasn't going to hold out hope for it. John grabbed the file hanging off Harold's desk and went to the board to study everything they knew about their number at the moment. It's rather cut and dry, and John could see exactly where the man was in trouble already. He's promised to sell a copy of the same book to two different buyers. Odds are he's only got one copy and is holding out to see which buyer will give him a better deal. The threat is mostly coming from a small arms dealer whose hobby is collecting rare poetry books. John seriously doubted that the charity also trying to buy the book has it out for Mr Delaney, but he did not disregard the notion entirely, considering all the twists they've had in cases so far. Once he's gotten a handle on where he's going to start tracking their number, he turned back to his partner.

Harold was staring at the screen in confusion, something that John has rarely seen before. He tapped a couple of keys and muttered, "That is odd, he doesn't seem to exist." John was a little stunned. It was the first time Harold had not immediately pulled up everything there was to know about someone in minutes. He strode out of the library quickly leaving Harold to his conundrum. According to Gary Delaney's last e-mail, he was meeting one of the buyers at an abandoned house in a nearby suburb.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> handwavy computer things, I know nothing about hacking or creating new identities

Sam didn't like this, the house was too exposed, too many entry points to keep track. He tried to tamp down his hunter's instincts about walking into a trap, but they were always on. Even after eight months of living a semi-normal life, he still had issues. It had been easy to stop hunting, but it was hard to curb the behaviours created by his former lifestyle. All of the acquisitions specialists had been called out so he had volunteered to do a rather routine book trade. It wouldn't even be his first one since they had been short for days and he had spent the last week ferrying random books here and there. Some of the people he had met had ranged from mousy gothic waifs to grizzled mercenary types. At one point, Sam had even participated in an auction at Sotheby's. As thrilling as it was, he had felt a little nervous submitting a fifteen thousand dollar bid for a book on French and British pirate exploits in the Caribbean. However, that did not compare to the trepidation he felt when he checked out his next meeting location. Up until this one, all of the other trades and buys had been in public places with fairly reputable collectors or their representatives.

Once he had gotten the assignment it had looked rather easy until he had read up on the bookseller. Sam had called the centre coordinator about the very dubious nature of the meeting place. He had marginally relaxed at the carefree way she had told him it was typical for this seller, that they had a few minor issues with him but it was nothing violent. The guy was sleazy but usually came through in the end. It was ten minutes until his meeting when he saw the guy enter the house, Sam had been sitting down the street for upwards of an hour, and no one else had approached. He exited the car, leaving the book behind. He wasn't going to risk a first edition like that until he had confirmation of payment. If the guy was legit he could always come back and get it out of the car.

Sam knocked on the door to and was mildly surprised when a lady answered it. "Um, I have an appointment with Gary Delaney?" he asked. 

She smiled somewhat stiffly, "Yes, my husband is expecting you." Sam relaxed a bit, it wasn't a safehouse; it was the dude's house. She pulled back the door and let him through. Sam followed her through the living room down a hallway to what was probably going to be the den. The man who came up behind him would have gotten the jump on him had the mirror down the hall not been there. Sam whirled around a moment too late, and the guy's knife sliced through his side. He stumbled back into the door sill of the room just in time to be hit with a face full of chloroform. The last thing he saw before he passed out was his buyer on the floor surrounded by a bunch of unknown men and the woman looming over him looking very angry.

* * *

John arrived at the address on Gary Delaney's e-mail just in time to see a group of men leave. He went around the side of the neighbour's back yard and jumped the fence. The back door of the house was closed but not locked and he crept in listening for any stragglers.

John cleared the room then approached an unconscious man handcuffed to a chair, he paused for a moment as he recognised him. Seconds later he spied their number handcuffed to the table leg on the floor. “Hello there,” he said as he approached the two of them. The man in the chair was bleeding from a knife wound; it been wrapped poorly, but John gauged that he'd be okay for the moment. He looked over to the table next to him and spied the handcuff keys. He noted an odd array of weapons on the table and as he stopped to admire a strange looking knife he heard footsteps coming down the hall. He uncuffed two men quickly then took position by the door and waited. John took out the first two and was about to pull his gun when a body went barrelling past him. He stood back and watched the young man take out the other two with almost the same brutal military precision he had employed. There was a click and the young man yelled, "Down!

John hit the floor as a spray of bullets ripped through the walls. He had a moment of realisation before the bullets stopped but had to shove it aside to assess the situation. The young man jumped to his feet the moment it was clear and ran toward the door John came in. John moved to follow him but then realised he would have to abandon his chase to take care of their number. He moved out into the corridor and startled the man with the machine gun, he kneecapped the man then knocked him out when he fell to the ground. John zip-tied the man's hands and left him for the cops to find in the front room. Going through each room he found the rest of the house was empty and completely ransacked.

Going back into the other room he saw that Mr Delaney was coming around. John smacked his face lightly to help speed him along. He could hear cop cars in the distance so he hefted the man up by his arms. Thankfully he had regained consciousness and with John's help was able to stagger to the car.

"Who are you?" he slurred out.

"Just a guy who wants to know why people would want to kill you for a book. I'd also like to know who was the guy you were meeting."

“Another bookseller, Sam Miller from the Alexandria Organisation."

John’s earpiece crackled to life, “Nice to hear from you, Harold. Did you get that?”

“Yes, Mr Reese. Looking him up now.”

John heard Harold making interesting humming noises as he drove back to the safehouse. Their number stared blankly out the window, strangely not questioning where they were going. John pondered this for a moment before the realisation came to him, "Harold, the e-mail for the meeting, did it come from the Alexandria Organisation?" He turned to his passenger, "Mr Delaney, do you normally meet with your clients at your house?"

"Who are you people? And no, this is the first time I've met one of their representatives in private."

"Just consider us a concerned third party. You didn't think that was odd?"

"Well... it was a really rare book. This is the first time they've sold me a book, instead of buying one. And it's not like the ones that I normally get for them either. The books I find for them are downright _weird_." Mr Delaney stared at him for a moment. "You're not from the Organisation, are you? Oh man, I swear I don't know anything about where he got that book so could you just let me go? I just wanted to see if I held off a bit the buyer would give me a better price. I didn't know they would trash my house."

Harold chimed back in, "Mr Reese, this quite clever. The email originated from the Alexandria Organisation, but the email was altered once it hit Mr Delaney's inbox. It appears that someone changed the meeting place then sent a reply back from Mr Delaney with the changes."

"Someone hacked my e-mail?" The book thief exclaimed. John sighed, this was beginning to border on annoying. One greedy low-level thief was preventing him from finding his soulmate.

John parked in front of Harold's safehouse and yanked open the passenger door. Pulling Mr Delaney out, he frogmarched him into the building. "Did you realise that you were trying to scam a gun dealer with a book you didn't even have? How were you even going to get it?"

Mr Delaney whined, "The guy from the charity was going to trade it for some creepy occult books I found last week. It was supposed to be a routine trade."

Once inside, John deposited Mr Delaney on a couch with a rather threatening look to stay put. He walked over to where Harold was fussing to himself over his laptop. "Sam is my soulmate too," he muttered to Harold.

Harold paused for a second and stared at him before continuing his work. "I suppose the only way to eliminate the threat to Mr Delaney is to find our soulmate and complete the transaction."

Harold motioned to his screen, "Sam Miller, archivist for the Alexandria Organisation for the last 10 years. Born in a suburb of Columbus, Ohio and graduated from Ohio State University with a degree in Folklore. There are bank records, student loans, all of the normal activity of a very average middle-class American.

John cocked his eyebrow studying the records displayed, "It's very thorough."

"Indeed, Mr Reese. It's also entirely fake. It's polished enough to fool an average background check, but it's still incomplete in a few areas. Unless one was looking for specifics it's certainly a good enough cover identity. Over the last six months, it's being slowly and subtly updated. A few more months and this would fool seasoned law enforcement."

John rocked back on his heels, he looked over to where their number had fallen asleep, "So where is he now?"

"That is another enigma, I wasn't able to access the Alexandria Organisation's computers. It appears they only have a few connected to the internet for e-mail purposes and no networked computers or Wi-Fi in any of their buildings. Their employee records are virtually inaccessible. You could say that they are a very private organisation." John snorted but Harold ignored him and continued, "I used their closest location to the bodega and the street corner I bumped into him to narrow down the search area. It looks like he's staying here."

John noted it was a long-term stay hotel only a few blocks away. "Well, then I guess we better get going Harold." He stepped back from behind his soulmate's chair and walked to the door. Harold glanced over to their number. The safehouse would effectively keep the man from going anywhere, but he had a few reservations about just leaving the man to his own devices. John huffed and roused the man.

"Where are we going?" Mr Delaney asked as he was unceremoniously shoved out the door.

"To pick up your book," John replied.


	3. Chapter 3

Sam had a fifth of whisky and a suture kit out when someone knocked on his door. When he didn’t answer he heard it being jimmied open. Sam checked to make sure the scalpel was close enough should the intruder not be whom he was expecting. He wasn't too worried since he had long figured out the tall dude would probably come looking for him at some point to retrieve the book.

He could go to a clinic, his new insurance would cover it and then some, but he was still a little too set in his ways. He didn't want to create any more new records than necessary if he could help it. He was concentrating on getting the stitches straight when a shadow fell upon him in the bathroom. He looked up expecting the taller man and was surprised as he was accompanied by someone familiar. "Oh, it's you," Sam said stupidly to the bespectacled man.

“Is that even sanitary?” The man made a face as Sam pulled the needle through his flesh. The taller guy was watching him with a rather neutral expression that Sam knew was covering up all sorts of things. He had seen and done the stoic thing before. It was slightly unnerving because now that the adrenaline was wearing off, Sam could feel the reason they were both here. He flushed slightly, realising they were getting a good eyeful since he was shirtless. They could see every scar and tattoo on his uncovered torso.

Sam wasn’t thrilled that his soulmates had found him, the discovery just came with the knowledge that everything in his life just got a hundred times more complicated. He had finally gotten some months of respite and now everything would be dragged into the open again. “I’ll be done in a moment here.” The taller man moved to the door, hovering protectively as the older man approached him.

“Can I help?” Sam hesitated; the last person who touched him was the doctor that gave him his physical for his insurance. If he had to remember the last time someone touched him that he trusted, it would have been Cas. He must have taken too long to answer because the man clarified, “I know how to put in stitches.”

“Um, no, that’s not… um,” he stopped, realising he didn’t even know the man’s name.

"Harold.”

“Sam,” he offered back. “Um, sure.” He turned slightly holding out the tweezers with the needle. It would be a relief for once to not have to do it himself.

Sam sat absolutely still as Harold put in nine more stitches. While he was sewing, John looked between them and stated, "I think you might have been unconscious for my words."

Sam grimaced, "Well at least mine was memorable if short."

"I'm John," he answered apropos of a question. "Also, not that unique, considering I was in the Armed Forces."

Sam frowned a bit, finding the association a bit distasteful. He looked the man up and down and sighed, "I don't know what to do with that," he muttered, making John frown slightly and wonder what was going through Sam's head. Once Harold was finished, he wiped an alcohol swab over the wound. Sam didn't even flinch, which made John frown even more. The older man looked between them and sighed. Sam realised with a start that Harold needed a bit up help from where he had knelt to put the stitches in. His breath caught as he touched the other man's forearm as he helped him up. The stared at each other a moment before Sam shrugged his shirt back on and they collectively moved to the other room. Sam saw his client sitting in his kitchenette handcuffed to the refrigerator door. He ignored him to focus on his soulmates.

"So what were you doing with Mr Delaney?" Harold asked. Although they both already were aware of the situation, he and John knew it was better to have Sam explain why he was there instead of having them reveal their involvement.

"I'm a bookseller for a private charity. We sometimes have extra copies to sell. I'm really just a librarian." He hesitated, glancing over to where a small pile of books and papers were resting. John noted that the most interesting thing was not the amount of paperwork but the Taurus and several wicked-looking knives also sitting out, one of which he recognised from the safehouse.

Harold glanced at the table where Sam was looking. "Oh my god! Is that an original Tamerlane?" Harold brushed past him to study the book. His hands hovered over the manuscript and John watched as Sam panicked a little when it looked like Harold was about to touch it. The older man quickly withdrew his hands and placed them at his sides once he realised just how fragile the item was. John snorted when he heard a sigh of relief from Sam. Harold finally spied the weapons and turned to study Sam intently. "I highly doubt you are just a librarian. Your records are suspiciously clean. Sam Miller is very unoriginal."

Sam tensed, which caused John to tense. The younger man might be their soulmate but that didn't mean he wasn't dangerous. Everything about him so far pointed to some sort of clandestine operative. Sam looked between the two of them, his face a mixture of indignant and defensive before his shoulders drooped in resignation, "It's also super common, unique names tend to stick in people's heads. Plus, I thought Sam Smith would be a little too trite." He huffed a little bit, "However you want to paint it, that is _my_ name now, I do file books all day, and I was trying to trade a book on behalf of the charity I work for."

It didn't escape John and Harold notice that emphasis that Sam used was on the possession of his name and not the time of owning it. It made them both insatiably curious as to Sam's previous identity, but it wasn't as important as their soulmate's attachment to his current identity. Both Harold and John could understand; it was who they were to each other now that was important to them.

Sam glanced over to Mr Delaney again, who was fidgeting and looking like he'd rather be any place other than where he was. "Can we go into the other room?" Harold and John clocked the hypervigilance and they both came to the conclusion at the same time that Sam's new identity was for his protection. John wondered why Sam didn't bring anything with him as they moved back into the other room until he realised that somewhere in between getting dressed in the bathroom and moving into the bedroom Sam had slipped a gun into his back waistband. Sweeping his gaze around he noticed for the first time, lines of salt rimming the doors and windows. Looking at Harold he saw that the older man had seen them as well.

"Sam Winchester, Lawrence, Kansas," he said as he plopped down on the bed. "Don't make any plans for bonding or anything else before you learn about him." Sam pulled out his cell phone, "I'm going to call my work and check in while you do that." He turned away from them as the call connected.

Harold looked at John in consternation, this was worse than when the two of them had fumbled their way around each other. At least they had checked their words and recognised each other as soulmates. Sam seemed determined to ignore their bond for some mysterious reason linked to his past identity. John was primarily concerned because Sam referred to it like a separate person, it was a dissociative measure usually taken by operatives in deep cover. It seemed like their future as bondmates hinged on how well they accepted his past self.


End file.
